OWOW Development Axes Office Component In Oakland Project
OWOW Development started demolition on a structure at 1510 Webster St., making way for a mixed-use development in Oakland, California, that will include residential and retail components, but will forgo a previously planned office space.
The property was originally slated to contain 222 residential units and 9.5K SF of office, but oWOW scrapped the office component in favor of more residential units, primarily due to the low demand for offices in the Bay Area.
“Nobody works out of office anymore. People gave up on offices,” oWOW CEO and co-founder Danny Haber told Bisnow.
The 19-story, 236-unit complex will include 42 units of income-restricted housing, according to SF YIMBY. The developer plans to use mass timber on the project.
Just under 3K SF of retail space will make up the ground floor, and shared open spaces are planned on floors seven and 17. The company hopes to complete the property in 18 months.
Construction pipelines for the Bay Area, particularly for multifamily housing, have been particularly full the past two years. San Francisco has a glut of permits and stalled construction, prompting the state of California to launch an investigation into the delays.
San Francisco Supervisor Dean Preston called the investigation “disappointing” on Twitter, referring to it as an “All Housing Matters” approach.
“Remarkably, HCD's announcement of an investigation into SF housing policies does not even mention affordable housing. Not once. Clearly, it's not a priority for @California_HCD in this investigation,” he stated on Twitter.
